The Coliseum Commission, well into its negotiations with USC on a long-term lease, met for nearly two hours in closed session Wednesday to discuss whether the NFL should factor into those discussions.

The NFL and the Coliseum spent 3 years negotiating terms and a potential lease agreement, but the league's owners decided last October that with skyrocketing costs - estimated at close to $1 billion - they were tabling their pursuit of returning to the Coliseum or the other site they were considering, Anaheim.

USC has worked on three- to five-year leases and school officials have said they don't have an interest in a long-term deal, which would require them to finance capital improvements to the aging stadium, unless they were the only tenant.

Meanwhile, Coliseum officials have received mixed signals from the NFL. They continue to have dialogue with NFL staff, which has indicated its interest in the site. But there appears to be little interest - let alone momentum - from the owners to take up a potential return to Los Angeles.

At the last two league meetings, in March and May, the issue - a staple on the league's radar since 2003 - was not on the agenda.

- we're where we were with the NFL as far as deal terms, which is very far along," Coliseum general manager Pat Lynch said after the commission's monthly meeting. "The debate on the NFL is we don't know where we stand. We sure would like to know where we stand, so we discussed ways of trying to find answers."

The Coliseum Commission next meets on July 18, by which time Lynch said it hopes to have those answers.

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